Critical Bolivian journalist set on fire by masked men

Bogotá,
October 31, 2012--The Committee to Protect Journalists calls on Bolivian
authorities to investigate the motive and find the masterminds behind Monday's
vicious attack on a Bolivian radio journalist who was set on fire in the station's
offices in the southern city of Yacuiba. A studio technician was also injured
in the attack.

Fernando
Vidal, 70, owner of FM station Radio
Popular, was hosting a show when four masked men burst into the station
offices, according to news
reports. The men shouted for Vidal and when he appeared, they poured
gasoline on him and the equipment in the studio, news reports said. They set
the fire with a cigarette lighter and then fled the scene, according to Esteban
Farfán, Vidal's son-in-law and a Radio Popular journalist. Farfán told CPJ that
station employees put out the fire with water.

Vidal
was in stable condition in a local hospital with second-degree burns to his
face, arms, legs, and stomach, Farfán said. Karen Arce, 25, the studio
technician, was also hospitalized with burns on the face, legs, and feet,
Farfán said.

Although
the studio was seriously damaged, the station continues to broadcast, Farfán
told CPJ.

The
attack occurred during an interview program hosted by Vidal in which he and his
guests were discussing the issue of contraband items crossing the border, news
reports said. Yacuiba, a city of 100,000 people, sits just two miles from the
border with Argentina, and contraband vehicles, foodstuffs, coca leaves, and
cocaine constantly move back and forth across the frontier, according to Franz
Chávez, coordinator of the monitoring unit of Bolivia´s National
Press Association.

Farfán
told CPJ that Vidal, a former politician, had often criticized local
politicians on his show and had received a constant stream of threats over the
telephone and in person from disgruntled public officials.

Local
police arrested three suspects who were suspected of participating in the
attack, according to news reports. No motive has been given. A government minister said in a press
conference on Tuesday that the suspects had refused to speak to the police, but
that authorities suspected there was a mastermind behind the attack and that
they would continue to investigate, news reports said.

"This
horrifying attack demands an intensive investigation that roots out not only
the assailants but all those who had a hand in its planning," said Carlos
Lauría, CPJ's senior program coordinator for the Americas, said from New York.
"Bolivian authorities must not allow criminals to dictate what people can and
cannot hear on the airwaves."

The
attack was the second against the Yacuiba press in the past four years. In
2008, the Unitel TV station was attacked with explosives, an incident that authorities
never resolved, according to news reports.

CPJ
has documented threats and attacks against the Bolivian press in recent months.
On October 13, Wilson García Mérida, the founder,
editor, and owner of the biweekly Sol
de Pando, and his general manager, Silvia Antelo, fled the department
capital of Cobija for three days after they were harassed twice by
investigators. Three radio stations were attacked with explosives
and dynamite in a period of two weeks in June.